Lara Schnitger - Contemporary Artists

Grim Boy

Lara Schnitger

Grim Boy

2005
wood, fabric, and mixed media

180 x 150 x 51 cm

Swathed in black with fuzzy face and dangling dreads, Lara Schnitger’s Grim Boy is the epitome of skulking teenager: grody, rank, and insipid. Draping fabric over a wooden frame base, Schnitger perfectly captures the awkwardness of physical development, disproportioned and gangly, torso bugling with the remnants of puppy fat, head thrust forward in a spit of aggression. Her jostling laugh at pubescent boorishness turns quickly to horror. In the light of Columbine, and the recent spate of goth gang murders and suicides, adolescent angst poses as real threat, a demon seed bread from cultural anxiety.